


dear gravity

by thememoriesfire



Category: Glee
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-06-30
Updated: 2011-06-30
Packaged: 2017-10-20 21:20:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,341
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/217203
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thememoriesfire/pseuds/thememoriesfire
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>For justsomethingsthatmakemehappy, who wanted Quinn and Rachel in college in NYC, where Quinn is flourishing and Rachel is not so much.</p>
            </blockquote>





	dear gravity

Kurt is going to start pestering her any second now.  If it’s up to her, she’s staying here forever: in bed, curled up with a thumbed-out copy of  _Pride & Prejudice, _wondering why nobody in the classics ever mentions the part where real life is a giant  _let-down_  and the reality of it is that Elizabeth Bennett might be really special in her own head, the Mr. Darcys in the world are never going to see her for what she really is, and she’ll probably die a spinster; alone in a crummy apartment on the outskirts of Brooklyn while her gay roommate is having the time of his life.

Okay, so maybe she’s projecting a little, but how else is she supposed to feel?  The results list still glares at her from her desk.  A  _B+ average_.  

She’s  _never_  been average at anything.

Kurt knocks on her doorframe and sighs.  “Rachel; you need to snap out of it.”

“Why?” she asks, without putting the book down, even though she’s reached that point where she just wants to slap everyone in it.  “It’s my entire  _life plan_ , Kurt.  It’s not something I can snap out of.”

“Sweetie, you’re the most talented girl I know, okay?  So what if there’s other talented people out there?”

She almost throws the book at him in a reflex, but that’s not how she is; she’s not Santana Lopez, spitting at things in broken and really grammatically incorrect Spanish when she’s off the handle.  

She just burts into tears and says, “It’s not that they’re talented.  It’s that they’re  _better_.”

She didn’t get the lead in the fall musical—just as she hadn’t her freshman or her sophomore year—which would’ve been okay if she’d gotten the lead in the spring musical.   _Evita_ , for God’s sake.  She was  _born_ for that role.  Her dads both agreed; Kurt smiled and helped her practice.

She rehearsed her ass off, and got overtaken by this blonde girl from North Carolina who nearly broke glass with her end note.  No  _Evita_ for her.  The depression of that had hit so hard that she’d also completely messed up on all of her exams.  A C- in  _musical theory_.  The first time she read her assigned textbook she was thirteen.  She has it mostly memorized, for God’s sake.

Kurt sits down gently at the edge of her bed and squeezes her leg.  “You just need a break.  There will be plenty of time for you to beat yourself up tomorrow, and honestly, I don’t think I’m entirely comfortable leaving you alone with the state you’re in.”

“What is this party, anyway?” she asks, unwillingly, but she knows Kurt well enough after three years of living with him to realize that she’s not going to win this argument.

“Art gallery opening up in Soho.  Blaine got us tickets; yours are plus one, so if you want to call someone…” Kurt says, raising his eyebrow.  “A friend?  Maybe that Richard guy that you saw a few times—”

“His hairline is receding, and he doesn’t know a single musical,” Rachel says, miserably.  “I’d rather just—tag along.  If it’s not too fifth wheel.”

“Rach, you’re one of us,” Kurt says, with a fond smile.

Sometimes, she’ll picture their wedding.  It’ll be extravagant and understated in equal parts, because Kurt is crazy and Blaine is not, and she’ll be there as Kurt’s best man, or whatever, next to Finn.  Who will also be married, much like everyone else she knows.

She was okay with the idea that she might have to sacrifice love for her career, and it was no hardship to end things with Finn before moving to New York.  Just bittersweet, really, but he’d wished her the best of luck and he’d meant it.

It hadn’t been enough to actually make her succeed, all those well-wishes, and now she’s starting to wonder what she’ll actually be like at Kurt and Blaine’s wedding:

“That’s Rachel.  She was the best singer in Glee club.  Back in high school.”

She takes a deep breath and says, “Thanks.  Stop me from getting too drunk, okay?”

Kurt smiles and gets up to start rifling through her closet, because somethings never change, and after three years he still doesn’t trust her to dress herself.

*

She’s staring at what looks overly much like an artistic take on a vagina with a glass of Merlot in her hand, while Kurt and Blaine talk to their friend Charles—actually in the art world—and she’s wondering when, exactly, the entire concept of art became so off-putting to her.

(Maybe at that point where her entire  _life_  had been about art, and it’s letting her down in so many ways that she’d rather take a Slushie to the face again than think about it.)

Somewhere across the room, some girls are laughing at something, and it’s so high school all over again; she’s never figured out how to connect with women, not least of all the ones she’s competing with.  Mentally, the crowd of girls has already been dubbed the Cheerios, and she’s swallowed the rest of the wine by the time she turns around.

It’s instantaneous—the dread up her spine, the feelings of regret, the _misery_.  She recognizes her by her hair; that bright, promising haircut that had surfaced at the end of junior year, when Quinn had finally pulled herself together long enough to realize that Finn wasn’t the totality of her world.

Quinn’s arm is wrapped low around another girl’s back, and Rachel stares at it like she’s imagining the entire thing; Quinn, with a  _woman_.  It’s not friendly.  Friends don’t stand this close together, last she checked.  That hand that’s wrapped around the other woman’s waist—a brunette, she notes, absently—is sort of… stroking.

Then, because the universe truly hasn’t rained on her parade enough for one year, Quinn laughs again and Rachel jolts back to that awful moment of realization that hit her in her freshman year of high school:  _she’s so pretty that I would die if she ever actually noticed me_.

She’s kissed girls since then; who hasn’t, at Juilliard?  It’s the one thing she has in common with her classmates: rampant experimentation and way too much drinking.  Somewhere around sophomore year of college, she gave up on the idea that she was  _better_  than all of that, and worked on fitting in.  That didn’t go much better as a general life plan, but Merlot is  _really_ good at stopping her from dwelling on the fact that the highlight of her life to date is winning a national show choir competition.

They lock eyes.  Rachel expects nothing of it, least of all the visible surprise on Quinn’s face, let alone the way she smiles cautiously after a moment and whispers something in her … her  _date’s_ ear.

Her grip on the stem of her empty wine glass is so tight that she’s worried it’ll snap, but Kurt swoops in behind her and says, “Replacement”, switching her empty for a new without asking.

“Wow,” Quinn says, moving in front of them.  Rachel stares at her wine glass, blissfully full again, even as Kurt says, “Holy moley.  Finn told us you were in the city, but we always thought—”

“—that you’d undoubtedly have no interest in seeing us, given that you despised us throughout most of high school,” Rachel says, a little dully, before finally looking up at Quinn.

Quinn’s smile freezes on her face for a second, but then she forces a laugh and says, “It’s been a long time.  It’s actually really good to see both of you.”

It comes out sounding so sincere that Rachel’s brain hemorrhages at the idea of this  _genuine_  person in front of her being anything near the girl who tormented her first and then ignored her all throughout the latter half of high school.

“Columbia, huh?” Kurt asks, smoothly.  He’s always been better at working a crowd than Rachel is, because she doesn’t know how to not be honest and the only thing she wants to say to Quinn is a hearty  _fuck you_.  

“Yeah, pre-med.  It’s rough, but—I love the city,” Quinn says, with a small grin.

It suits her face.  It doesn’t suit a single memory Rachel has of her, however.

“Doctor Fabray.  That has a certain ring to it, I won’t lie,” Kurt says, before gently nudging Rachel in the side.

“What about you two?  Stardom, as inevitable?” Quinn asks.

Rachel hears sarcasm where there is none, and levels Quinn with a look that she wishes could actually kill her.  “Of course.  What else did you expect?”

Kurt clears his throat and says, “Rachel just finished her exams and is having a moment.  Don’t mind her.”

“Oh.  Did—”  Quinn frowns and then says, “Actually, Sophia was saying something about maybe going to see the Juilliard spring musical.  What is it this year?”

“Ooh boy,” Kurt says, nudging Rachel’s arm until she takes a grudging sip of wine in lieu of answering.  “ _Evita_.  It’s—Rachel’s been busy this year, so… that’s not really in the cards.”

“You’re not  _in_ it?” Quinn asks, with a frown.

There is absolutely nothing to say to that whatsoever, and Rachel finishes her wine before saying, “If you’ll excuse me, I need to be somewhere else right now.”

She feels Quinn’s eyes on her as she retreats, and for  _God’s_ sake, what’s happened to her?

She’s been many things around Quinn, but never a coward.

*

She doesn’t smoke, even though half of her classmates do.

It’s hell on her voice, obviously, and disgusting and generally just pretentious and pointless.  She doesn’t need to solicit cancer in order to feel like she’s Bohemian enough for the city.  Yet, when she steps outside and Blaine’s friend Mark is there, fumbling a pack of Camel Lights, she asks for one anyway.

In a weird, abstract way, she gets why people pick up on this habit; it’s an excuse to leave horribly tense situations, and a way to spend five minutes doing absolutely nothing.  But the taste is vile, and after two drags she flicks the rest of the cigarette away.

The city rampages on around the gallery.  She can’t remember the last time she was actually,  _actually_  alone, because there’s millions of people around her always, and while some part of that thrills her even now—those millions have always been her intended audience—the rest of her just wishes that she could magically teleport back to Lima and spend just  _three days_ regrouping in her dad’s house.

She can’t, though, because she has some summer thing in a chorus on off-off-Broadway, and while to Kurt it feels like the promise of greatness, she’s basically seeing it as penance for her apparently over-inflated ego all these years.

“I’m sorry.  I didn’t mean to… overstep,” Quinn says, next to her, coming out of nowhere.

Rachel’s too exhausted to tell her to fuck off, so instead she just says, “I’m sure some part of you is thrilled at the idea that all my mouthing off about how talented and amazing I am hasn’t gotten me anywhere.  Pretending’s not a good look on you, Quinn.”

She glances over to see Quinn in a leather jacket and a scarf, with this ridiculous fedora perched on her head, and almost bursts out laughing.  But it’s too much between them, even now, and instead she just waits as Quinn clearly struggles for a response.

“I haven’t thought of you much at all, in the past three years,” Quinn finally says, before hazarding a cautious glance over at Rachel.  “But whenever I did, I never imagined anything other than that you were happy… finally out of Lima, realizing your dreams.”

There’s only ever been one person who could wrongfoot her like this in her entire life.  It’s miserable that that’s still true.

“Yeah, well,” Rachel says, closing her eyes and tipping her head back against the brick wall behind them.  “At least one of us is, right?”

There doesn’t seem like there’s an awful lot to say after that, and Rachel jerks in surprise when a small card is pressed into her hands.

Quinn shoves her hands in her pockets seconds later, and just says, “I really  _am_  a different person now.  Lima wasn’t suffocating to you alone, Rachel.  And I’d like it if we could be—”

“Friends?” Rachel asks, not liking the tremor in her voice.

“I know it’s a big ask, but—you look like you need one.  And I’ve never forgotten that… you offered me your friendship, back when I really needed it.”  Quinn glances away to the pavement, glistening with street light and dirt, and then says, “I couldn’t handle it then, but maybe you can handle it now.”

Rachel’s fingers clench around the card, bending it and hurting it, because it’s all she can do.

“I wouldn’t start holding my breath,” she says, not particularly maliciously, but just because it seems like a nicer way to say  _no_  than actually using the word.

Quinn’s flash of a smile is wry, and then she turns around to where that woman—Sophia?  her girlfriend?—is waiting.

Rachel watches as they amble down the block, arms in touching range most of the time, but hands not connecting.

She wonders if she’s reading too much into what that means.

*

The card disappears into a desk drawer for two weeks, and then—after another gruelling shift at the cafe she works at, with at least two men pawing at her ass and one guy underpaying, cutting her tips in half almost literally—she finds herself caving, bending over the drawer and digging it back out.

She calls without thinking if it’s a rude time to call or not because they’re in fucking New York City; nobody ever sleeps.

Quinn answers with a sleepy, “Hello?” though, and maybe 2am is the exception to the rule of what a  _good_  time to call is.

“I don’t want anyone in Lima to hear about this,” Rachel says, abruptly.

“What—who—”  Quinn yawns loudly and then says, “Go back to sleep”, almost inaudibly.

Rachel ignores the spike of  _whatever_  in her gut at those words, and focuses instead on the rustling that clearly means Quinn’s leaving the bed—her bed, whatever—and moving elsewhere.

“Rach?  Is that you?” she asks, still drowsy.

“No, it’s Sue Sylvester,” she snaps, without meaning to.

“I’m—what—why are you calling me at 2am?”

“Because—you  _know,_ ” Rachel says, miserably, before sinking into her desk chair.  “You know that I’m—that I’ve  _failed_ , that I haven’t made it, and you’re still in touch with Santana and Brittany, I’m sure, and—”

Quinn swallows audibly and then says, “Actually, Kurt said you were too busy preparing for a role on the actual stage to do  _Evita_.”

“Oh,” Rachel sighs.

Next thing she knows, she’s burst into tears, and Quinn is completely silent on the other end of the line, just waiting for her to stop sobbing.

“For what it’s worth; I’m not  _that_  close to anyone in Lima,” Quinn finally offers, softly.

“I just can’t—” Rachel says, with a deep breath, and then there’s nothing else to say.

She just can’t.

Quinn Fabray has had a lot of moments where she just couldn’t, either, though, and all Quinn says is, “Do you want to meet for a drink somewhere?  Tomorrow?”

Rachel nods, before remembering that that doesn’t work on the phone, and then finally says, “I’ll text you a place.  I mean.  I have your number, so.”

It’s probably the shortest, most coherent sentence she’s ever uttered in Quinn’s presence, and when Quinn just says, “Okay.  See you tomorrow, then”, it feels like a minor victory in an otherwise overwhelming moment of defeat.

*

The leather jacket is back, as is the hat, and Rachel smiles unwillingly when she sees what Quinn’s wearing.

“What?” Quinn asks, not sounding at all self-conscious.

“You’re just—so  _gay_ ,” Rachel says, lacking more subtle words.  “I—I mean, it’s none of my business, but—”

Quinn slides into the seat in front of her and tilts Rachel’s glass, judging what’s in it.  “Always Merlot?”

“I like consistency,” Rachel says.

Quinn nods after a moment and then tugs on her hat for a second, before sighing and saying, “You’re not the only one with some stories that shouldn’t make their way back to Ohio, okay?”

Rachel visualizes a section of Quinn’s closet that’s all dresses and wedges and hairbands, and smiles unwillingly. 

“When did you know?” she asks, instead.

Quinn shrugs and says, “When  _didn’t_  I know?”

It’s a fair enough answer, and when Quinn pats around her pockets and says, “I’ll get this round; any particular Merlot?”, Rachel hesitates for just a moment before saying, “Actually, I’ll have what you’re having.”

*

The conversation is stilted.  Of course it is.  They never have spoken much, and so there’s not just three years to catch up on, but also four years that precede that that neither of them seem to really want to talk about.

Safe subjects include Finn, and Kurt, and Blaine.  Unsafe subjects include Sophia, whoever she is, and Rachel’s career prospects.

Quinn talks about pre-med like it’s literally the most torturous thing ever, but with the brightest smile on her face.  It’s triumphant.  It’s the smile that Rachel knows she would’ve had on her face if she’d won prom queen, but it’s  _so much more_  deserved here.

“I love the city,” Quinn says, glancing out the window for a moment.  “I was terrified I’d hate it; it was impulsive, you know, applying to Columbia.  For a long time I thought I’d go to UCLA with Santana and Brittany, but—there’s only ever been one place in the world that someone has actually made sound  _magical_.”

Quinn has the New York that Rachel always thought she was destined for, and she’s too far into the bottle to bother hiding it.  “I don’t know.  Behind all that magic, there’s a lot of ugliness.”

Quinn thankfully doesn’t look at her in that horrendous, sympathetic way that Blaine sometimes does, or that she can hear in her Daddy’s voice when she has to tell him that once again, she didn’t get the part she auditioned for.  She just tilts her head and says, “Sure.  But certain people are always going to rise above that.  Someone convinced me of that a long time ago, and I’m not inclined to change my mind now.”

Rachel takes a deep breath and sinks further into the booth, fingers tapping on the table.

“So, your girlfriend,” she finally says, flushing when Quinn gives her a surprised look.  “I’m sorry, I thought we were being sincere in this friendship thing.”

“She’s not my girlfriend; we’ve just… been on a few dates,” Quinn says, carefully.  “I’m—it’s taken me a long time to be comfortable with who I am, and I don’t think I’m exactly relationship material right now. …  I have some hang-ups, still.”

“Yeah, I know what that feels like,” Rachel says, looking at her empty glass of Jack & Coke with a sigh.  

“You and Finn never thought about…” Quinn asks, tentatively.

Rachel actually laughs; she’s surprised into it, but it’s not a bitter laugh.  “Gosh, no.  I mean, he still thinks the height of the world is OSU winning a football game.  I might be a little down on the count, and New York isn’t what I expected, but—”

She locks eyes with Quinn for a moment, and feels that same jolt of something that she always has felt when Quinn’s eyes are focused on her.  It’s the most neutral expression, but somehow, she’s never known how to not chase after it.

“I want a lot more than Finn Hudson, no matter how obnoxiously conceited that sounds.”

Quinn’s lips twist into a smile, and she murmurs, “Well, thank God you’re still ambitious in  _some_ ways.  Or I’d have to call a doctor, or something.”

“You  _are_ a doctor,” Rachel points out.

“Not yet,” Quinn says, with a small wink, before picking up their empty glasses and heading back to the bar.

The conversation has quickly turned mildly flirtatious, but that’s not a big deal; it’s just sort of how the city works.  Every conversation is a game, and Rachel has learned to play it in the time she’s lived there.  Boys or girls—it doesn’t really matter.  Everything’s an innuendo to  _someone_.

The words don’t matter, but… the way she scans up Quinn’s legs to her ass, hugged by tight, skinny jeans, and then stares at the back of her neck, where her hair ends and there’s a patch of skin that’s just begging to be kissed, is probably a little more out of the ordinary.  Even for her.

She doesn’t stop looking until Quinn turns around with the drinks, and even then, she stops looking only because Quinn offered her  _friendship_.

If she wasn’t good enough back in the days when she was absolutely the best Lima had to offer, she has no idea why on earth she’d be good enough now.

*

She knows she’s staring at Quinn’s lips when they say goodnight, and she knows Quinn knows it too, from the way that she hesitates for a moment before saying, “This was… unexpectedly nice.”

“You thought it would be bad?” Rachel asks, dragging her eyes upwards and frowning.  “Then why—”

“It’s not often you get second chances,” Quinn says, with an unbelievably open expression on her face.  Like she really, really means it.  “I haven’t gotten too many, anyway, and—”

“Right,” Rachel says, and then runs a hand through her hair before saying, “Well, for what it’s worth, I got over high school a long time ago.  As it turns out, the real world’s a lot worse.”

Quinn looks faintly hurt at her statement, which was really meant to accomplish the opposite of that.  “I just meant—”

“I know,” Rachel says, sighing and saying, “In case you haven’t noticed, I’m a little—not myself, these days.”

“You’re still you,” Quinn says, softly.  “I just wish you’d see that.”

She whistles for a taxi before Rachel can say anything else, and then says, “We’re in opposite directions, but—again, sometime?”

Rachel nods, once again completely at a loss for words.  Quinn’s smile is like a gust of wind, gone before she knows it, and then all she sees is a girl with a ridiculous hat disappearing down the street in a yellow cab.

She wonders if it’s normal to spend so much of her life watching the same girl flit in and out of rooms without her ever saying what she really wants to.

It’s summer in New York, though, and maybe she can change that.

*

 _When did you know you were gay_?

It’s a crude thing to ask in a text message, but Rachel has gay-friendly written all over her life, and her blunt honesty really should just remind Quinn that they have history—not more than that.

 _Junior year.  Shortly after Prom._

There’s a slight pause, and Rachel wonders how to phrase her next question without saying too much.

 _When did you know you weren’t straight_?  Her phone asks, before she can come up with anything sensible at all to text back at Quinn.

She smiles, because leave it to Quinn to beat her at her own game.

 _Parties at Juilliard are kind of… interesting_.

There.  That’s nice and neutral, and not at all about how the first time she saw a Cheerios skirt, she immediately went on the internet to learn a little bit more about teenage hormones.  

Just to figure out how to  _ignore_  them, mind, because Rachel was optimistic at the start of ninth grade—not actually  _deluded_.

Cheerleaders were never going to be a part of her life in a positive way.  Not back then.

*

The next time they see each other, Rachel is a  _lot_  more relaxed.

“No more elephants, huh,” Quinn says, in kind, with a knowing smile, before dropping an insane amount of sugar into her Americano.

“Where’s your hat?” Rachel asks.  She kind of misses it, even though it  _is_ ridiculous.

Quinn glances up, tearing up another sugar packet, and then says, “I have class today.  I try not to be so—well, Santana calls it ‘blatant’, whatever that means.  I just—try to look professional, in professional settings.”

Two weeks ago, Rachel would’ve said something snide about how appearances are apparently still everything, but her heart’s not in it today; not with Quinn looking relaxed in that white blouse, rolled up at the elbows, literally trying to give herself a sugar overdose.

“Why were you always so awful to me, back then?” she asks, instead.

Quinn’s hand freezes in place, long after the last grains of sugar have made their way to the bottom of the cup, and then she carefully picks up her spoon and starts stirring, lips pressed together.

“Are you actually ready to hear an answer to that?” she asks, finally, glancing at Rachel for just a second.

“Kurt noted the other day, over breakfast, that your … fuck buddy bears a passing resemblance to someone you went to high school with,” Rachel says.  She wonders if she sounds calm.  Her heart feels like it’s beating its way out of her chest.

“He did, did he,” Quinn says, in a controlled but small voice.  “And what was your response?”

“That he’s crazy, because—you were way out of that person’s league back then.  Let alone now.”

Quinn’s fingers slip off the spoon, and Rachel stills when she’s levelled with the most furious look she’s ever seen on Quinn’s face.

“Don’t  _ever_ say that,” Quinn says, calm and incensed, all at once.  “If there’s any way that we’re going to rewrite history, it’s by saying that you were too good for  _me_ in high school.”  When Rachel opens her mouth to protest, Quinn shakes her head.  “I’m serious, Rachel.  Just don’t.”

Rachel’s breath catches in her throat.  “So—”

Quinn sighs.  “Yeah.  I had a thing for you.  I didn’t know how to deal with it other than by shoving you away as much as I could, and while I don’t think I _could’ve_ been any different in Lima, I sure did spend a lot of time wishing I was someone else back then.”  It comes out flat, which weirdly enough is the part that convinces Rachel it’s the truth.

“Okay,” she says, simply, before adding a, “I’m sorry—I didn’t mean to push” when Quinn looks at her disbelievingly.

“Okay?” Quinn asks.

“Yeah, okay,” Rachel says again, before clearing her throat and saying, “Some friends and I are considering doing Shakespeare in the Park this year.  Not in Central, obviously, but—sort of impromptu around where we live.  Small, for friends and family.”

“Right,” Quinn says, slowly; looking absolutely confused.

“And—you should come,” Rachel says, taking a deep breath.  “It would really help me to have someone around who thinks I can actually—do this.  Still.”

“Rachel,” Quinn says, sounding so sad that Rachel makes a noise and then pushes onward with what she’s really trying to elicit.

It’s not sympathy.

“My life… it’s not what I had planned, you know.  I was going to be on Broadway by now, doing something; instead I’m begging for scraps behind the scenes, and none of it’s fun anymore.  I’m starting to actually  _hate singing_ , which is just…”

Quinn looks at her carefully and says, “Singing is such a part of you, though.”

“Yeah, I know,” Rachel admits, and then glances at the table.  “But it’s not all that I am.  And, frankly, I want the New York that  _you_ love; a city where maybe, some dreams do survive, and—well, it looks like my career is going to be more struggle than fantasy, so…”

She doesn’t think she’s ever said anything  _less_  clear in her life, and Quinn’s face flickers from one emotion to the next for a long few seconds during which she can barely breathe.

“What dream are you talking about?” Quinn finally asks, in a tight voice.

“The one where… the prettiest girl I’ve ever met actually wants to be near me,” Rachel says, before laughing wryly and saying, “God, that sounded a lot less stupid in my head than it did out loud.”

Quinn’s hand covers hers, on the table, in a flash.  “No, don’t.”

“Don’t…”

“Don’t be anything but who you’ve always been.  It’s—”  Quinn hesitates and then smiles.  “I like you spontaneous, and unpolished, and kind of dorky.”

“I’m sure,” Rachel says dryly, with a passing glance at their hands.  “If I hadn’t been all of those things, we could’ve probably been friends in high school, you know.”

“That wouldn’t ever have been enough for me, Rachel,” Quinn just says, low, and Rachel feels herself sucked back into looking at Quinn—no, blatantly staring, this time—when Quinn’s fingers tighten around her own.  “Ohio wasn’t for us, but—”

“Yeah,” Rachel says, twisting her wrist until they’re actually holding hands.

It’s a wonderful moment, spoiled seconds later by Quinn blandly adding, “It’d be great if you could do something a little more exciting than Shakespeare, though, if I’m meant to sit through six hours of amateur theater without killing myself”, with a poorly hidden grin that has Rachel huffing at her for a second.

Until another blinding smile breaks through, and when it mirrors on Quinn’s face, she feels accomplished for the first time in almost three years.

*

She’s singing in the kitchen when Kurt comes home, and he looks at her warily.

“Are you self-medicating again?” he asks, perching against the counter.

“Nope,” she says, and then smiles and says, “Well, not in the way that you’re thinking.”

He’s the loveliest guy she’s ever known, so it’s not a surprise that he just squeezes her into a hug and says, “Oh, hallelujah—two star-crossed lovers, finally speaking the same language.”

“There was nothing going on between us in high school,” Rachel notes, shutting off the tap and washing the first of several plates with Kurt’s arms still around her.

He sways them both, for a few moments, and then he says, “Good.  Because I think you wouldn’t have stood a chance.  But maybe now…”

Her phone rings, almost on command, and Kurt holds it up to her ear and she says, “Hey—aren’t you coming over in a while?”

“Sure,” Quinn says, and then laughs shyly and says, “Does that mean I can’t call?”

The feeling in her chest is so similar to the rush of a standing ovation that she’s glad Kurt’s still holding onto her.

“No,” she says.  “Call whenever.  Including at 2am.  When I’m in bed with other people.”

Kurt laughs behind her, pinching her in the side.

Quinn just mumbles something before hanging up again.

“Oh, dear.  Poor her,” Kurt says, dropping the phone back on the counter and pressing a kiss to Rachel’s cheek.  “What are you doing later?”

“Dinner with Quinn,” she says, not bothering to hide her smile. 

“Tomorrow, then?” Kurt asks, because it’s been a while since they’ve had matching days off, and Rachel glances at him while sticking the last plate into the drying rack.

“I would—but there’s an audition for… Eponine, in Les Mis next week, and—”  She takes a deep breath and then smiles wryly.  “I think that I’m okay.  With the prospect of being rejected, or perhaps not being polished enough for the role right now.  I’m—yeah.  I think I’m okay.”

“So you’re going to go for it.”

Her phone vibrates again as she dries her hands—and it’s probably just Quinn telling her not to be such a jerk about something that really didn’t mean a thing to her, but still.  It’s  _Quinn_.  Texting again.  Even though they’re seeing each other in a few hours.

She can’t help her blinding smile, and watches as Kurt’s face relaxes into one as well.

“Yeah.  I’m going to go for it,” she says.

She believes it, this time.


End file.
